rippo

i see, i think i've had this under my finger nails before :rotfl:!! No offence taken cw thanks for yor help. Just to clarify, are we talking about one type of graphite grease? As i read it ones hard and ones slippery. looking on google there seems to be a few differnet grades and prices :shocked:, can you point me in the right direction or do bedford give a grade?

Yeah i appreciate that mate, thanks.:rofl: I was just wondering if copper ease was a similar thing. Maybe a modern equivilant, as there's loads hanging around at work. :box:

Thats what my dad dose on his!! is copper ease the same as graphite grease?

Mainly i'm trying to avoid the rusty mess you usually get on the face of the springs. Hopefully with blasting each leaf it should stop it for a while. If bedford suggest it then it must be the way to go.

Hello, I will be putting the leaf springs back together at the weekend, i've shot blasted, primed, and painted with top coat each leaf, when i rebuild them should i put grease between each leaf? if so what grease shall i use?

My mate dived the ss heritage empire, off ireland. Here's a link to his site with the pics. http://www.paul-webster.co.uk/Gallery28/index.htm

Hello, It may not be a bitsa! The olive green paint i think was the factory colour, i've seen it on a number of mws and is very similar to the first colour on mine. There were a number of campaigns after the war where it could have been painted sand then the raf blue on top of that when it came back. The raf number on the back of the seat is the one it would have had on the door or possiblly the bonnet. We restored a raf mw, we found a similar number on our doors and "cruising speed 30mph", under years of paint. The numbers can turn up anywhere i've seen them on the rocker cover, chassis, and back bodies, guess it came down to what the paint shop fancied at the time or how they intrepreted the instructions. It looks like it may be the raf markings on the front. Maybe there'll be another number next to the four. The raf marking were usuall a capital letter, followed by a slash or a commar then a number, ours had M/44 on the wing, but i have seen other letters used, and in different places. Boring!! this is the best bit, you never know what your going to find, and probably the best way of finding its history, rub very carefully!

hello, I'm just in the process of restoring a 1940 bedford mw, as seen in the introduction. At some point it has been fitter with the later type engine side panels with the slots in rather than the earlier panels which had one large slot with a grill/mesh behind it, i know these are very hard to come by but sometimes they do turn up. I traveled 200 miles to a dealers when he said he had a set, but when i got there they were reproduction one's and were completely wrong. He said he would keep his eyes open and if any turned up he'd grab them and let me know. :bow: I was chatting to the dealer at war and peace and mentioned the side panels, and he said someone had offered him an original set that morning!! but he had forgotten i wanted them and let them walk away!!!:angry! I could have cried!!:rofl:!! Somewhere in this massive showground is a person with the parts i'm looking for!!! If anyone knows this person with the panels for sale or indeed know of a set of early side panels for sale please let me know. thanks

hello, I'm just in the process of restoring a 1940 bedford mw, as seen in the introduction. At some point it has been fitter with the later type engine side panels with the slots in rather than the earlier panels which had one large slot with a grill/mesh behind it, i know these are very hard to come by but sometimes they do turn up. I traveled 200 miles to a dealers when he said he had a set, but when i got there they were reproduction one's and were completely wrong. He said he would keep his eyes open and if any turned up he'd grab them and let me know. :bow: I was chatting to the dealer at war and peace and mentioned the side panels, and he said someone had offered him an original set that morning!! but he had forgotten i wanted them and let them walk away!!!:angry! I could have cried!!:rofl:!! Somewhere in this massive showground is a person with the parts i'm looking for!!! If anyone knows this person with the panels for sale or indeed knows of a set of early side panels for sale please let me know. Thanks

hello andy, I was only at war and peace as a spectator, i think your thinking of the brown one, owned by morris a dutch gentleman. His is mint and built about a year before mine, some really early stuff on his, and he's absolutley fasinating to talk to, knows his early bedford mw's inside out. I could have screamed when i was there, i'd really like an early set of bonnet sides for the mw, the type with the mesh/grill in rather than the slots, as it has got on now. There's not alot to making them but i'd really like an original set, and i know these things are around, it's just talking to the right people. I was talking to one of the dealers and mentioned it to see if he'd come across any, and he told me a bloke had offered him some earlier, but he forgot i wanted them!!! But he said if he walked past again he'd grab him. If anyone knows this fella with the side panels, or indeed know of a set for sale please please please let me know.

Thanks guys, she does photograph well!! Whoever did the restoration originally did a lovely job, plus i think its always been garaged an well looked after since. Close up the rust is just starting to bubble in a few places and the paint has started to flake, so rather than brush over it i've decided to strip it down shot blast it a repaint it in a wartime camo. Also the later bush bar, headlights, and bonnent sides are fitted. So far i've picked up a early bar and restored a set of lucas L140's for it, and the rear bodies off so i deal with the chassis. I'm off to war a peace tomorrow, i know there's a couple of these about hopefully there'll be one there.

hello all, I've been looking at the forum for about a month now, but only just got my account validated so now i can post. spent most of my childhood under bedfords and around the shows so when i saw this mw for sale on milweb i just couldn't help myself! It was restored/ reregistered in 1986 in shropshire, but i think it spent most of the last 20 years in wales. has anyone come across it before? It seems very original, most of the rear body and cab are original. It has the full set of data plates, lubrication, cold start, coolant draining, vin plate, air filter instruction, and even the brass plate on the rear body with the contract number on. but it doesn't have a reconditioning plate on the chassis, nor dose the engine. The engine number doesn't match the vin plate, but the plate on the engine is a bedford reconditioning plate dated 1947, it is the earlier type engine with dog legged fuel pump bolts and earlier type distributor. I tried tracing the history, i thought with the contract number i'd have a good chance, but the rlc museum have no record. i've found a reference to the number in the bart vanderveen bedford bible! the contract was for 3500 mwd and mwc trucks. There is a picture of one of the trucks out of this batch coming off a landing craft in the book. I'm trying to find the WD number that would have been down the side on the bonnet in the bart vanderveen book it says Z4173216-6715 were allocated to this contact number, is there anyway i can narrow it down to my chassis number? Although the previous restoration done on the bedford was a nice job, the rust is starting to show in places again, so its strip down, shot blast, and repaint ready for next year.